The fifteenth century is generally accepted as beginning the Age of Discovery – or at least the discovery of the wider world by European powers. In Spice: The Sixteenth-Century Contest that Shaped the Modern World, Roger Crowley has set himself the task of bringing to life the competition between emerging European superpowers for control of the spice trade, the sea lanes, and global navigation. It is a challenge he meets with aplomb; Spice is riveting, thrilling and truly epic in scale.
Beginning with Francisco Serrao and Magellan’s attempts to reach the Spice Islands in search of cloves and nutmeg, Crowley takes us on a journey through time and across oceans and continents. It is a journey that includes the hard politics of carving up the globe in favour of national European powers (notably the Spanish and the Portuguese), which reveals the intricacies of economic competition in the war-torn Age of Reformation, and which recognises the advances in (and mistakes of) academic thinking as it related to growing understanding of the world. Crowley weaves these threads together in an outstanding narrative which never loses sight of the figures involved, from the unfortunate Tome Pires (chained up on being captured by Chinese rivals) to the urbane, inquisitive Andres de Urdaneta (an Augustinian with a keen interest in the Pacific). General readers will find a great deal here that is fresh, fascinating, and impeccably recounted.
The overarching theme of “Spice” is the race for global domination – or, rather, the international race to win the advantages of an emerging global market. Not forgotten are the people who were exploited, from the native inhabitants whose lands and lives were ravaged by enterprise to the sailors who gambled on a chance to make their masters – and themselves – rich. Self interest and greed recur throughout the narrative, as they should; but Crowley does not neglect the genuine sense of interest in the world that the trade wars energised. Nor does he neglect the sometimes shocking reports with which adventurers justified their actions abroad: recounted are contemporary tales of cannibalism and allegedly amoral acts of over sexuality. This is a story of people – their fears and prejudices, their desires, their cruelties, and their technologies.
Throughout, “Spice” is illustrated as magnificently as it’s written; colour images, maps (incredibly useful) and contemporary prints give extra life to the story of the Spice wars. This is a book which will appeal to anyone with an interest in European and world history as well as economic history; but so too is it a richly-woven tale that will thrill anyone curious about the greed, endurance, and venturous spirit of humans across time. Crowley is to be congratulated on a book which is not only eminently readable and rich in human drama, but which explores the birth of the modern global world.
Steven Veerapen is a writer and historian and the author of The Wisest Fool: The Lavish Life of James VI and I.
